Digital Archeology: An Answer to Obsolete Machines?

Technology Review reports on an exercise in understanding the operation of an obsolete CPU, the 6502 chip in the Commodore 64 and Apple II, among others.  I didn't follow the link in this quote, because I'm not really that techie, but it strikes me this is one answer to the problem of obsolete hardware causing the loss of data: the simulation of operations on modern hardware:

They've chronicled the results of their work at Visual6502.org, where they reveal that their understanding of the 6502 has become so sophisticated that they have not merely mapped all of its transistors and connections, they've actually managed to simulate the workings of the entire chip.